She nodded; unable to speak.
"I'm sorry," said Lindsay.
"Look, Lindsay--" started Tom Lacy.
Lindsay interrupted. "Lacy, I'm the one to be sorry. I mean it.
Pity--is hard to take, even to give honestly. You don't want it, yet it
is there. Yes," nodded Lindsay, "if there's anything, ever, that we can
do to see you straightened out, we'll do it. Now--"
The phone.
Lindsay picked up the phone and said: "Garrard got it! Where's the next
one?"
Haynes said: "Take the one in the Ruhr Industrial District. How'd
Garrard get it?"
"We don't know. He went out unplanned, wondering if utter secrecy
mightn't be the answer."
"Too bad," said Haynes and hung up quickly. The general didn't like the
tone of Lindsay's voice.
* * * * *
Lindsay faced them. "What do we know?" he asked. He felt that he'd
been asking that question for year upon year, and that there had been
no answer save a mystical, omnipotent rumbling that forboded ill--and
that threatened dire consequences if asked to repeat.
"Not a lot," said Grant. "They go off when we get within a hundred feet
or so of them. That's all we know."
"Garrard went out without running his intercom radio. He made no
reports, thinking that maybe they listened in on our short-range jobs
and fired them somehow by remote control when they feared we might
succeed in inerting the things!" Lindsay growled in his throat.
"Look," said Grant. "This is urgent. It is also knocking out our
nerves. It's not much of a run from here to Ruhr Industrial, but I'm
going to suggest that we all forget the problem completely for a few
minutes. Me, I'm going in to take a shower."
The value of relaxation did not need pressing. Jenna nodded. "None of
us have had much of anything but coffee and toast," she said. "I'm
going down and build a real, seven-course breakfast. Any takers?"
They all nodded.
"And Ralph, you come and break eggs for me," she laughed. "So far as I
know, I'm the only one that's capable of taking your mind off of your
troubles momentarily."
Lindsay laughed and stood up.
Lacy said it was a good idea, and then added: "I'm going to write a
letter."
The rest all looked at one another. If Tom Lacy were writing a
letter, it meant that he'd taken some new interest in life. Wordless
understanding passed between the other three and they all left Lacy
sitting at the desk.
* * * * *
The autopilot was bringing the ship down toward the ground out of the
stratosphere, slanting toward the Ruhr when Jenna snapped the intercom
switch. "Breakfast," she called. Her voice rang out through the ship.
Grant came immediately and sat down. Lindsay was already seated. Jenna
served up a heaping plate of ham, eggs, fried potatoes, and a small
pancake on the side. "This," she smiled, "is too late for a real
breakfast, but I demand a breakfast even if it's nine o'clock in the
evening when I first eat for the day. There's more if you're still
hungry."
"We'll see," said Grant. He picked up his knife and fork but stopped
with them poised. "Where's Lacy?"
"I'll give another call," said Jenna, repeating her cry.
They fell to, attacking their plates with vigor. But no Lacy. They
finished and still no Lacy. "Come on," said Jenna. "Maybe he's still
feeling remorse. We'll find him and then we'll feed him if we have to
hold him down and stuff him. O.K.?"
"Yeah," drawled Grant. "Feeding does wonders for my mental attitude.
It'll do Tom good, too! Let's find him."
They headed for the scanning room, but it was empty. The desk where
they'd left him was as though he had not been there, except--
"Letter?" queried Lindsay, puzzled. "Now, what--" his voice trailed
away as he slit the envelope and took out the sheet of paper. He
cleared his throat and began:
"Dear Folks:
"I put no faith in Garrard's suspicions, but since he was lost
without an honest chance to prove them, I am taking this chance.
"I am taking my skeeter when I finish this and I'm going on ahead,
alone. Knowing you as I do, I'll have plenty of time to inspect
that robomb before you read this. I'm explaining my actions because
I feel that you may need explanation.
"I think the world and all of both Jenna and Ralph, and feel that I
may have caused suspicion and unhappiness there. Since I'll have
time to take a good look at this thing and also make some motions
toward defusing it long before you arrive, or even find this, let
my success be a certain statement of the fact that knowledge of my
actions by any of you--or even suspicion cast at the presence of
the Decontamination Squadron Ship by the enemy--is not the
contributing cause. No one will know until I'm all fin--"
Light filled the scanning room, and the ship rocked as it was buffeted
by the blast. The light and the heat and the sound tore at them, and
they clung to the stanchions on the scanning room until the ship
stopped rocking and then Grant made a quick dash for the autopilot,
which was chattering wildly under the impact of atomic by-products. It
stabilized itself, however, and the ship continued on down through the
billowing dust to the ground.
"That," growled Lindsay, "loses us Lacy and proves nothing."
"Not entirely," drawled Grant. "It does prove that whatever agency is
directing these things does not require the presence of this ship as a
tip-off."
"A lot of help that is."
"Well, I'm nominated for the next try. Unanimously. I'm the only one
voting any more."
Jenna gasped.
"What's the matter, Jenna?" asked Grant.
"I just realized that you were all that's left. Just like that--and in
a few hours. Poor Lacy."
"Lacy?" said Grant. "He--got his release. It's what he's wanted. May we
all find what we want as quickly."
"I hate to see any one courting death, though," said Jenna.
"My only regret for Lacy is that we don't know whether he--and
Garrard, by the way--went in the same way."
"Meaning?" asked Grant.
"The rest got it as they headed out to defuse the things," said
Lindsay. "At about a hundred feet. We can only assume that Garrard and
Lacy went in the same way. I'd like better than an assumption."
"Why?"
"A hundred feet is too distant to detect the human body without
radiation. It presupposes either a warning of some type or--" Lindsay
scowled and stopped. He mumbled something about a conference with
General Haynes. He stepped to the autopilot and set it for the next
location. Then he left to seek the privacy of his own office from which
to call General Haynes. As he left, Jenna lifted a worried face to Jack
Grant.
"Jack," Jenna said, "he doesn't trust me any more."
"It does look bad," said Grant. "After all, every one of them came in
your presence."
"They came in your presence, and his."
"Admitted. But--"
"I know," she said, with deep feeling. "But I can't help being Martian.
My loyalty is with Ralph."
"Jenna," said Grant softly, "we know that. All of us know it. Yet,
there's some agency that is tipping them off. There's been robombs
at the other sites for hours now, and not one of them has gone off.
They're tying up production until we arrive, and they'll continue to
tie up the area until we make a false move. Something or someone is
giving them the tip-off. I know it isn't me, you know it isn't you, and
Ralph knows it isn't him. The areas are completely cleared, but, of
course, there may have been watchers. But Garrard would have gone out
unlighted, and possibly Lacy would have done the same."
"Jack," she pleaded, "do you suspect me, too?"
"Jenna, you know I do. I rationalize myself, and tell myself that it
isn't so. But nevertheless, there is that lingering doubt. Evidence,
Jenna. Evidence."
"Jack, a criminal is considered innocent until proven guilty."
"Jenna, that's for the safety of all who may be accused. But
considering a man guiltless does not prevent people from making
charges. And there have been many occasions where the accused was
forced to go through a strenuous period before proving his innocence.
What they really mean is that they will not punish a man against whom
no true conviction is brought. Until he is convicted, he can not be
punished. And it is up to the authorities to prove his guilt. It is
also up to him to prove his innocence. But considering him innocent
permits his own testimony to be considered as valid as that of any
witness instead of marking it off of the books as the word of a guilty
man."
"And I?"
"Forgive me, Jenna. I think the world of you, and there is in me a
rather violent mental storm. One side--the larger side, insists that
you are loyal, and above reproach. The other side, that tells me
to beware of the woman in you, that if you were really clever and
treacherous, you would hurl these doubts out in the open and cause
suspicion to fall upon yourself. And, you are Martian. A sort of racial
instinct warns me. It's unfair, and I dislike myself thoroughly for it."